In bird slaughterhouses, birds are generally trussed prior to packaging with one or more trussing elements such as cords, plastic or metallic ties or elastic bands, to retain the bird's members such as wings or legs in a stable position with respect to the bird's body. Usually, known trussing procedures require various levels of human involvement, from wholly manual to automated operation wherein either bird handling or bird trussing is still performed by a human operator, which operations are highly repetitive, stressing and strenuous due to high production rates involved in modern bird slaughterhouses, and may cause chronic injuries. The use of trussing systems such as supplied by Siebeck GMBH (Eberbach, Germany) requires an operator to present the slaughtered bird to the system in a predetermined position and orientation according to the desired trussing pattern. Shaping apparatus to prepare birds for packaging such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,458,380 are also known. Other bird trussing systems requiring some human involvement in the trussing operation are disclosed in international PCT published applications no. WO 2006/003418 A1 and WO 2005/011389. Other systems attempting to provide wholly automated trussing operation are disclosed in international PCT published application no. WO 98/11784 A1, in European published patent applications no. EP 1 419 697 A1, EP 413 629 A1 and EP 425 400 A1, and in European Patent no. EP 493 852.